


Encre

by NoelleAngelFyre



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: "Are we dating?", Aftermath of trauma, Canon Compliant, Dealing with sickness and trauma, Domestic Fluff, During Canon, F/M, Family, Family Feels, First Time, Mentions of canon character death, References to Canon Events, References to Prison Time, Season 12/13, Strangers to Lovers, a question of faith, fathers and daughters, life transitions, mothers and sons, season 7, starting a new chapter
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-13
Updated: 2019-08-04
Packaged: 2019-10-09 05:36:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17401013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoelleAngelFyre/pseuds/NoelleAngelFyre
Summary: They meet in a park: an artist on a bench and an agent on a case.





	1. Prologue

_Salem, Oregon. 2012._

She’s an anomaly: skin painted in shades of gold; eyes the biting dove-grey of a winter dawn; hair the frost-white of new snow. Her clothes are those of a starving artist: thrift store quality, from the tattered hem of a sweater two sizes too-large to rips in her denim characteristic of long-term use. Perched on a public park bench, she sits with legs crossed as a means of support for the canvas stretched across her lap. An array of pastels and charcoal is beside her, accommodated by her petite frame on an otherwise narrow bench seat. Her hair was piled away from her face, but the action was not planned; she shoved two pencils into the mass, and haphazardly so. Strands fall in great volume around her cheeks, and there are smudges across the right side from stained fingertips shoving hair away.

There is, essentially, something raw about her. Visceral. Transparent. It makes him want to come closer – if, for no other reason, to see what it is she’s creating on that canvas.

As it turns out, she’s recreating a tree: a tree that’s been growing in the park for decades to which no one else pays any attention…and she’s immortalizing it on a canvas.

It occurs to him he has been staring too long, too obviously, when she addresses him first.

“Would you like to sit down?” her tone is confident but not cocky; she’s distracted, and he knows her interest is most definitely not with the random guy staring at her in the park.

“…Sure.” His track record of awkward interactions with the female population is continuing strong. The descent is made much too stiff and his lower half makes a thud on the metal. He waits for a comment, or at the very least a stare, but her focus is on the canvas. As far as she’s concerned, he doesn’t exist beyond another physical body.

It’s…refreshing.

“What’s your name?” the question comes after five minutes of silence, in the same casual tone. He blinks, then answers. The first attempt comes out winded, like a timid squeak, so he clears his throat and tries again.

“Reid. Doctor Spencer Reid.” He frowns at himself; that sounds like he’s throwing his credentials around.

“Do you like art, Doctor Spencer Reid?”

“I find it aesthetically pleasing, if the mediums are placed in the right hands.” Spencer answers; they have a case, and he shouldn’t be meandering in a park just to clear his head for five minutes (or, as the case presently stands, fifteen minutes), and he should definitely not be chatting up a random woman. It’s inappropriate behavior.

“Are yours the right hands?”

“I sincerely doubt it.” He answers. “I couldn’t even handle water colors.”

“Water colors, by definition, is a wasted method and an even poorer tool by which children are introduced to art.” There is a slight edge to her words now: the kind a person uses when the things he or she says are not only of great personal import but also sacred knowledge. She knows art; she knows a lot about it, and she’s proud of what she knows.

He can appreciate that.

Five more minutes of silence. He needs to get back.

“Thanks for letting me sit with you.” He says, because it would seem impolite to just to get up and walk away. Normal people don’t do that. “I have to get back to work.” He adds that detail, even though she didn’t ask questions.

“Isabella.”

Spencer blinks and looks at her with a small frown pinched between his eyebrows, “Excuse me?”

“Isabella Harrington.” She lifts her head; she has two new smudges in shades of purple across her cheeks. “If you feel like sitting with me again, I don’t take up too much space.”

Three days later, the case is closed and he’s back on the park bench. She has a new canvas in the early stages: nothing but pencil strokes and vague smears of grey interrupting white. Her hair is a messy braid down one side and a thin mass of loose strands across the other.

“Were you flirting with me?” he blurts the question out before better sense can bite his tongue.

“You have one of the highest academic titles in the country,” she says with dry amusement, “and it took you three days to figure that out.”

“I don’t have much experience with women.” She doesn’t need to know that, but he tells her anyway.

“Any time you feel like changing that fact,” grey eyes lift to his face, glimmering with a smile which hasn’t quite made it to her lips, “you know where to find me.”

***

_Salem, Oregon. 2017._

He shows up on her doorstep at a ridiculous hour and knocks three times. It takes her thirty seconds to answer.

“Hi.” He says; his voice is weary, a creak of vocal chords which haven’t been used in months. There’s nothing like having her right there in front of him to serve as a reminder that he hasn’t shaved and can’t remember his last good night’s sleep.

Prison isn’t really good for shaving or sleeping.

“Hi.” She answers, like there is absolutely nothing odd about him showing up on her doorstep at some ungodly hour. Her clothes are minimal, and most of the bared skin is smeared in various pastels.

A backwards step and inviting gesture speaks just as well as words; he steps in and finds the aroma of cinnamon pleasant in the air. Around the corner, the hallway opens into a large room – likely intended to be a living room, but she’s converted it into an art studio. There are canvases everywhere, from the finished to barely-begun.

“You look like Hell.” She hands him a glass of wine, carrying a second glass in her other hand, and heads back to her current project: a depiction of rippled water in shades of blue and grey, smeared with the vivid hues of a rising sun.

He can’t even take offense to that. “Isabella,” he says, for the first time, and finds her name mercifully complex; it requires multiple syllables and a lifting click of the tongue. She turns to look at him, waiting for a continuation, but he loses the intended thought and simply swallows half the glass contents in one motion.

It doesn’t take long before the alcohol warms the blood and dissipates tension across his shoulders. Now, she is turned from him, focused once more on canvas art; the hemline of her shirt is raised. The delicate sweep of her lower back is exposed in creamy shades of bronze; a thresher shark cuts a striking profile in black, dorsal fin molded into the base curve of her spine.

Spencer decides to ask her about it. Later.

He doesn’t finish the rest of his wine. She hasn’t even touched hers.

When he kisses her, he half-expects the world to stop spinning on its natural axis, but it doesn’t. The laws of gravity and physics don’t fail him. There are only her arms around his neck and thin fingers in his hair. Her lips are dry and chapped. She tastes faintly of honey.

Isabella breaks the kiss first, then takes his hand in hers and leads him out of the art room. He leaves his cell phone next to the unfinished wine glass.

Her bedroom is shades of blue and white: clean and simply furnished. There is a connection to the ocean present in subtle strokes: the choice of colors; the ceramic sculpt of two sharks entwined atop her nightstand; the mural mounted in place of a headboard.

He’ll ask her about it. Later.

At her upper arm, left side, he finds another tattoo: the hammerhead shark coiling upward with head mounting her shoulder. The mighty mako drapes over the opposing shoulder, and the dainty form of an angel shark rolls across her right hip. The ocean’s most cunning and clever predators, all painted in shades of glossy black on gold-brushed skin.

He kisses each and every one. In return, she finds the scrapbook of scars on his skin and graces each with the dry brush of fingertips and the warm heat of lips. From there, she continues downward, exploring his body as uncharted territory, until she settles between his legs and does something wonderful.

Logically, Spencer knows this isn’t how things are done. He doesn’t know this woman, and she doesn’t know him; their respective secrets, stories, and scars are layers to an iceberg which exists primarily beneath a visible surface. But right now, none of that matters, because he just needs to be normal. Sex is normal. Sex is natural. People do it, have it, all the time. The act is raw and hurts before it feels good and then there’s nothing but sensation.

He lets himself think of Maeve, briefly, and is pleased when it doesn’t feel like a betrayal. This act, this moment, isn’t a betrayal of a love lost before it truly began; this is a new chapter with an ending that hasn’t been written yet.

“You’ll have to tell me about her someday.” Isabella murmurs, when it’s over and they lay tangled in sheets of indigo-blue. Her fingers trace random patterns on his chest.

“You’ll have to tell me about these.” Spencer answers, thumbing the angel shark’s billowy pectoral fin. He doesn’t seek clarification on the identity of ‘her’, or ask how this woman does or doesn’t know; there is reassurance, oddly enough, in being with someone who hears confessions in the silence but lets the questions come in another time.

By definition, after all, someday ensures that the chapter’s end hasn’t been written for tonight.

They have all the time in the world.


	2. Faith

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “He doesn’t permit these things to punish us, baby; if they happen, it’s so we can realize how much we need Him to get through it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I received a request to expand this story some weeks ago; after further consideration, I have decided to make "Encre" a multi-chapter piece. This will be a collection of one-shots featuring Spencer and Isabella through the quiet moments, the hard cases, and family. Some will be inspired by existing episodes or be interconnected, while others will stand on their own.
> 
> As always, comments are love. :)
> 
> Disclaimer: I own nothing. I'm just having fun.

“Bad day?”

It’s the quiet moments, he’s found, which matter the most. The moments spent with the Victrola softly burbling out _The Marriage of Figaro_ , a fire low in the hearth, and Spencer is stretched across the couch with his head in her lap while thin fingers run through his hair. Moments wherein Isabella’s role is to listen and speak little.

“Seem to be more bad than good these days.” Spencer murmurs. The mildly bitter scent of her oil paint clings to the fingers now brushing his forehead and rubbing circles into his temples. It’s a scent he’s grown familiar with now. He’s even grown to like it.

“I thought she was doing better.”

He shrugs, “Maybe I just fooled myself into believing it. The placebo effect all over again.” He kisses her fingertips just to do it. “I don’t want to believe she’s getting worse because if she’s getting worse then it means nothing I do will ever change what’s happening to her, and if I can’t do anything to change what’s happening to her then I can’t do anything to change what’s going to happen to me.”

“Might.”

Spencer blinks. “Might.” He repeats the word as if it’s foreign; something he doesn’t understand when he otherwise understands everything.

“Might.” Isabella repeats the word like it’s perfectly normal. “You don’t know that anything is going to happen to you.”

“The statistics say—” her finger goes over his lips.

“Statistics can be manipulated.” Isabella says, “The research and literature can be misquoted, and the respective authors do not always know what’s best. Life is messy, baby,” his breath catches a bit; he’s still getting used to that particular term of endearment and the intimacy which is attached to it, “and you can’t always boil it down to science and the logic of printed word.”

“Science and logic have never failed me.” he answers quietly.

“You know what’s never failed me?” her smile is soft; it’s something he can appreciate about her: her expressions are always sincere and based on the emotional appropriateness of the moment, “Faith.”

Spencer falls silent for a time. “If I rely on science,” he says at length, “then there’s a grounded cause and effect. Genetics. The DNA of disease. The environment. If faith comes into play…” he pauses again, “…then all I have to look at is the presence of a higher being who is letting this happen to my mom, who could let it happen to me…and I don’t know what to call it other than a punishment for something I don’t remember doing.”

She shakes her head; a section of snow-white dribbles over her shoulder and brushes his nose, “He doesn’t permit these things to punish us, baby; if they happen, it’s so we can realize how much we need Him to get through it.” He reaches up to run fingers through the white strands to admire the look against his skin, “You’ve been running this race alone for a long time, Spencer…how has that been working for you?”

He says nothing, but kisses the fragments of snow-white hair against his lips.


	3. A Pencil and a Canvas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spencer has an unexpected visitor.

“Dr. Reid?”

Spencer pauses mid-step and makes a short visual sweep of the surrounding area before he identifies the speaker, “Yes?”

The man is average height, perhaps a bit taller; heavyset around the middle but muscled in the arms, he presents as a man who has lived at least some years working hard with his own two hands and still enjoying three meals a day without guilt. He’s dressed casually in dark slacks and a dark blue polo. His hair is salt-and-pepper (heavy on the salt) with a full beard cradling his jaw in a cloud of snow and thick eyebrows to frame dark eyes which twinkle with his smile, “I…I don’t suppose you know who I am.”

“No,” Spencer says, then (before his traditional lack of tact in social interactions can ruin another polite encounter) quickly amends, “I’m afraid I don’t.”

“Of course, of course,” his responsive chuckle is deep, rumbling up from the belly, but genuinely kind and without ridicule, “I didn’t expect you would. Bernard Winston,” he holds out a broad palm and grips Spencer’s hand in a warm gesture; his hands are dry, and his large arms have what is referred to as a farmer’s tan. His smile doesn’t falter at Spencer’s awkward pause and the embarrassing gap to his jaw; he waves a hand toward a nearby street-side café, “Buy you a cup of coffee?”

Spencer isn’t entirely sure if he would have accepted or refused; apparently, this man isn’t going to take anything else for an answer. Instinct (and a career as an FBI agent) mandates he either pull his gun or take other drastic action; but as he finds himself seated across from this man, his instinct seems less reliable. Mr. Winston has a grandfatherly air to him, and he doesn’t want for generosity: in the time it takes Spencer to stop fidgeting in his seat, the café table in front of them is filled with coffee and pastries. It’s a sugar-high waiting to happen.

“Please forgive me, Mr. Winston,” Spencer finally says, “but I honestly have no idea who you are or what you want from me.”

“Oh, I know, son.” He waves a hand, “I just hoped we might sit a while before we got right into personal business.”

“Oh. Okay then.” Spencer clears his throat and nervously adjusts his tie. Adjusting it won’t do anything; his tie is perpetually crooked, after all, but it gives him something to do with his hands before he starts fiddling with the napkins.

Mr. Winston chuckles, “Alright, son; let me try and calm your nerves: I’m Isabella’s father.”

Spencer manages to further embarrass himself by choking on air. “I-I…” he tries to string together some kind of intelligent response and fails spectacularly. Wonderful. Some genius. It’s not enough he regularly embarrasses himself with Isabella, now here he is making this kind of first impression with her father.

Her father.

“Wait…” he says slowly, as the pieces drop into place, “…which father?” he cringes as soon as the words comes out.

Mr. Winston grins at him, “So you know my girl’s history.” He sips his coffee, then continues, “I’m the natural father. Good ol’ Charles Harrington is the adoptive one – I take it you haven’t met him yet?” Spencer shakes his head once, and Mr. Winston nods, “Don’t worry, son; you’ll meet the whole family in good time. Assuming, of course, you intend to stick around.”

“What?” Spencer feels the shock like a current up his spine and jerks upright in response, “What do you mean if I…of course I—” he staggers off and lets the reality sink in with an inward sigh. Of course. That’s what this sudden meeting is about: the man wants to know what their relationship – Spencer and Isabella, together – is and how long it will last.

The problem remains, Spencer has been having some trouble with this subject as of late.

“Breathe, son, breathe.” Mr. Winston pats his wrist across the table, “Bella’s gonna have my head if I kill you on the first meeting.”

He blinks, completely unaware he’d been holding his breath, and exhales much too loudly, “I’m sorry. I just…” he exhales again, runs a hand through his hair, “…it’s all happened so fast. I mean, it’s only been…six months? Yeah, six months. Six months and eight days and – and you don’t really care about that.” He shakes his head, “Like I said, it’s been really fast and I don’t know…” he trails off, unsure how to finish that statement. He’s not even sure what he’s saying.

Mr. Winston pats his wrist again, “If you’ll indulge an old man’s recollections, Doctor,” he says, and when Spencer nods absently, he continues, “I spent my whole life in politics. Nothing national, though I occasionally had fantasies; just local. I met Diamond – that’s what she calls herself – at some social affair. She was charming, certainly not bad on the eyes, and we enjoyed our time together. The next morning, though, it was back to business and I went along my way…until one day I woke up and realized I was sixty-five years old and hadn’t done a single thing worthwhile in my life. No wife, no children…nothing. Epiphany like that can send a man in a downward spiral to a dark place. …And then one day,” a smile curves his mouth under the beard, “one day, I happened upon a young lady, no more than eighteen years old, sitting on a park bench with a pencil and a canvas.”

Spencer swallows quietly. He remembers that woman, sitting on a park bench with a canvas and pastels. “And for reasons you couldn’t explain,” he whispers, “you sat down next to her…and started talking.”

“Four hours,” Mr. Winston nods and takes another sip of his coffee, “Didn’t take long for the truth to come spilling out.” He smiles fondly, “Turned my world upside down, she did. The next week, I retired from politics, made her the sole heir to my estate, and bought a little cabin in Virginia.” His smile widens, “You should come and visit with Bella sometime. The weather there would do you good.”

A cabin in Virginia sounds as close to heaven as Spencer has ever heard. Assuming, of course, he’s…that they’re still…

“Eat your pastry, son.” Mr. Winston says cheerfully, “No point putting coffee in your belly unless there’s something to go with it.”

Spencer sighs, puts the thought to the side for a moment, and helps himself to the muffins.


	4. Change in the Wind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An impulsive proposal leads to a change of seasons.

The jet lands back in D.C. and two hours later Spencer is on a commercial flight to Salem. He lands around six in the morning and catches a cab from the airport. The cab lets him off about three blocks from Isabella’s townhome; he walks the rest of the way to clear his head. It doesn’t work too well. By the time he gets to her front door, he feels more confused than when he arrived in Oregon.

He reaches for the doorbell before remembering the key: the key she had specially made and shipped to D.C. with a little note on lilac stationary that promised him to use it whenever he wanted. And he really wants to, right now.

“Isabella?” he calls out as he steps inside, feeling like a stranger despite how many times in six months he’s managed to sneak away from the bustle of D.C. to the quiet reserve of Salem and inside this place. It doesn’t feel like home. Not really. Not yet.

“Hey, stranger.” She appears around the corner with her arms full of laundry; Spencer feels his heart melt a little, kind of like sugar under heat, to see her this way: cotton shorts, a loose T-shirt, and feet bare on her carpet, with a laundry basket propped on her hip and hair pulled back in a loose ponytail. She looks young, carefree, and happy. Always so happy.

“Hey,” he smiles weakly, then nods at her burden, “Need some help?”

“Could use some company.” She pops her head to the left in an emphatic gesture toward the stairs, then takes each stair with a bounce in her stride.

It marvels him, even now after everything they’re done, how easily he is welcomed into her life, into her world. She invites him to join her for a walk in the park, seeks his opinion on random pieces of art; they make dinner together, watch old movies, and now she’s inviting him into her bedroom to keep company while she puts away laundry.

Spencer opens his mouth and, as par for the course, manages to sound completely wrong. “Are we dating?”

Yes…that sounded horrible. Not to mention, colossally stupid.

“I…I mean,” he rubs the back of his neck; Isabella hasn’t stopped folding and hanging items even with his foot shoved so gracelessly down his throat, so he decides to shove it a little closer to his stomach, “I…I know we’ve…you know, been together. Biblically speaking, anyway. And in many other ways. And…and we do things together. When…when my job doesn’t…” he trails off and tries again, “I just…what I’m trying to say is—”

“What you’re saying is,” she turns to face him with an easy smile, “Daddy showed up unexpectedly and tossed that brilliant brain of yours like salad.”

“…yeah, pretty much.”

She laughs and motions for him to sit with her on the bed; once he does, her hand gently reaches out to entwine their fingers. His skin looks very pale against her creamy bronze; has he noticed that before? He must have. He must have noticed it a hundred times.

“I guess the bigger question here is…do you want us to be dating?” she gently squeezes his hand, “You want us to go steady?”

“I…I don’t know.” He feels tears in his eyes and can’t be sure just why he’s crying, “We…we’ve only known each other for six months,” actually, it’s almost seven now, but he doesn’t mention that, “and it’s all gone so fast…and l…the last time I…” the pause is longer this time, then he lifts a broken gaze that feels much too wet even if he can’t feel the tears down his face quite yet, “…I think I’m falling in love with you, Isabella, and it terrifies me.”

Her hand, warm and dry yet impossibly soft, cups his face, “Because of Maeve.”

It’s the first time her name has been spoken aloud between them, like this, and he finally feels the tears drip down his cheeks; the cold droplets scatter when he nods, “I loved her. I think I’m falling in love with you.” He wipes furiously at his eyes and pushes a hand to his temple, “I want to spend time with you. I think about being with you when I’m at work. I think about taking vacations just to see you, or – now – to go visit your dad and adopted parents in Virginia because that’s what couples do and even though I have no idea what couples actually do, I think it’s what they do and I want to—”

“Spence,” her hand locks around his mouth, “breathe.”

“I can’t.” he tips his face away from her hand, abruptly stands, and begins pacing, “I…I talk to you about everything. My job. My mom. The cases we work…everything. You’re just…just like a…a sponge. You just soak up everything and that’s amazing because there’s never been anyone else like that,” _other than Maeve_ , “but…but I don’t know anything about you. When Mr. Winston approached me…I had no idea he was your dad.”

Isabella is quiet, too quiet, and Spencer feels dread sink deep in his gut – until she exhales and gives him a small smile, “Maybe this is my fault. I thought, by not putting pressure on you…you would keep coming back to me.”

“I love you.” He blurts it out and doesn’t let himself take it back, “That’s what keeps me coming back.”

“And I love that.” She stands up and tugs him back with one hand, “Spencer…for all that I’ve shared with you over the past six months, there is a whole iceberg underneath just waiting for you. It’s all yours…if you want it.”

“And if I do?” he licks his lips, yet another nervous tic, “If I do want it? All of it?”

She takes another step forward, something playing in her grey eyes that makes his belly flip over twice, “Tell me what you want. Right now. Don’t overthink it. Just say it.”

Just saying things is what gets Spencer in trouble, and has for almost his entire life; but she asked and he is apparently incapable of denying her anything. “I want you to move. You don’t have to move to D.C. – I don’t think you’d like it there, frankly; I don’t really like it sometimes myself – but somewhere closer. Maybe somewhere in Virginia. I…I think you’d like Alexandria, in particular – but you can always—”

Her hand goes over his mouth again, this time with a smile. “Yes.”

“…yes?” maybe he didn’t hear right?

“Yes.” Her arms loop around his waist, “I’ll move. And I want you to help me look for a place. After all, you’ll be spending quite a bit of time there.”

His head is spinning off-axis. Yes. She said yes. He just asked for what he wanted and she gave it to him. What parallel universe is this?

“Hey…” she brushes her nose to his, “You in there?”

“Yes…yes, I’m sorry…I just…” he releases a shaky laugh, “This is real. This is actually happening.”

“It’s just the start, sweetheart.” Isabella grins, “And we have _all_ the time we could want ahead of us.”

**Author's Note:**

> Encre: French translation of "ink".
> 
> Disclaimer: I own no characters, events, or themes related to "Criminal Minds". I own only my original character, Isabella Harrington. Reviews are appreciated; please be gentle with any critique, as I'm just trying out this new character in a franchise I have loved from the very first season.


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